“He’s blowing me off!” I yelled into the phone, over the cool, whipping wind. There had been a break of the early November cold spell, with the temperature finally inching above five degrees, probably for the last time before winter really set in. It was a shot of endorphins for the city – the people who passed seemed to vibrate, their molecules unthawing one last time before their hibernation.
“He’s not blowing you off. He literally said he was sick, Kate.”
I had sent screenshots to Liz, who had promptly called me in reply.
“I think you’re just looking for reasons to be disappointed.” she continued. If I let her, she would monologue about my “emotional problems”, as my therapist had so aptly named them, for the whole walk home. I had gotten the text from Ben at work; I got a crazy fever last night and have been violently ill (I’ll let your brain fill in the gaps) all day. If I try and leave my bed, I actually might die, so I think I’ll have to rain check tonight.

“Kate, are you listening?” Liz’s tinny voice shouted through my headphones.
“Yes, of course-- of course I’m listening.”
I hadn’t been.
“What did I just say?”
“I don’t know, Lizzie, I’m--” she cut me off, philosophizing why I would answer her call if I didn’t actually want to talk to her. She made a good point. My therapist, Oliver, liked to imply I often got “too wrapped up in myself”, which was his polite way of suggesting I was self-centred.

I passed an Indian place I swear I had never seen before. It was crushed between two significantly larger restaurants, like a child holding hands with two giants. The smell wafting from the propped door was heavenly. I heard my stomach grumble; I hadn’t had time to eat lunch today.
“I just want to meet someone in real life! Like, an actual meeting, where you see someone cute and ask for their number. This app shit is too –“
“Too unaccountable, right?” Liz responded. She didn’t even chastise me for interrupting her.
“Yes! Like, what the fuck is that? Ghosting? Like, this is the dystopian novel, Liz. We’re in the middle of it, and everyone’s too busy fucking swiping to realize it!” I was standing outside the Indian place, peering through the windows. I had less than £40 in my bank account after paying rent this week, but it smelled so good.
Fuck it, I get paid Friday, I thought, as I dodged into the entryway.
“I think you should text him,” Liz said. “Save yourself the time later.”
“And say what? Hi, I know we’ve never met in person and you didn’t respond to the cute dog video I sent you when I said ‘feel better’, but I’m in love with you and think you should love me back?”
“Okay, well, like, no, not exactly that, but I mean-- you’re allowed to ask him if he’s like, serious.”
I grabbed one of the paper menus folded in a pile at the abandoned host stand. The place seemed empty. Liz was still going. “I don’t know, in like, a few days, just say “hey, feeling better? Let’s grab drinks.” with like a beer emoji or some shit.”
“I feel like it’s definitely his turn to offer to do something. If he wants to, he will. It’s not hard to ask someone for coffee.”
“You don’t know that! Maybe he’s – he’s shy!”
“Maybe I don’t want to date a guy who’s shy!”
“Kate, he bakes. He bakes!” She was good. Who doesn’t want a guy that bakes?
“Liz – Lizzie, I gotta go, I’m ordering dinner.” Before she could say anything else, I hung up. I knew she would yell at me for eating out again. She would say something about “living beyond my means”, and she would be right, of course. I pulled out my headphones, wrapping them carefully around my phone, and tossed it in my purse. I scanned the menu. No one had approached me yet, and I’d been standing in the entrance for at least five minutes.
“Chicken tikka,” I said aloud, feeling like I had to fill the empty space with something. Maybe someone would hear me. I placed the paper menu back on the podium and glanced around once more to make sure I wasn’t missing someone settled into a corner. Next to the stack of menus was a silver bell, the kind you might find at a hotel reception desk.
I slammed my hand down on the bell. The ring echoed through the empty restaurant. I waited, feeling oddly self-conscious. My fingernail polish had already chipped since I had painted them yesterday. One of my cuticles I had cut too far, and there were remnants of dried blood on my right ring finger… “Can I help you?”
I looked up from my hands. A girl, probably around my age, had appeared at the host podium. Maybe Oliver was right. I was self-involved. She was short-- at least half a foot shorter than me, and her head was shaved. She was pretty in the way I had always wanted to be pretty, where you could do anything to your appearance and still count as “attractive”.
“Hello?” she said. I hadn’t responded.
“Hi, sorry, um, can I get an order of the chicken tikka? To go?” my tongue felt fat and heavy in my mouth.
“Sure thing. It’ll be like, five minutes? That cool?” She was cool. I nodded my head in response. The entryway suddenly felt cramped. The yellow stucco walls felt like they were leaning in on me.
“You can sit, like, wherever. You don’t just have to… you know.” said the hostess, before disappearing around the corner.
I don’t have to stand here like an idiot, you mean?
I settled into a booth by the window to wait. I took my phone out of my purse, tapping the home screen to see if Ben had texted me back. He hadn’t. I pulled up the app we had matched on, finding his profile in my recent matches, and thumbed through the photos. God, he was cute. Exactly my type. Taller than me, which could be hard to find sometimes at my height; 5’9. We had had such a good conversation, going back and forth the whole weekend. I had given him my phone number after the first day, and he had texted me almost immediately. He was the one being forward, complimenting me, suggesting we grab drinks or coffee. Dating apps weren’t things I usually got excited about; I really used them as a tool for some kind of twisted self-validation, but Ben felt significant. Liz would’ve told me I was putting the cart before the horse. It wasn’t a habit I was proud of; but how often do you find a handsome, employed guy who bakes?
Oliver said he didn’t think these apps were good for me or my “emotional problems”.
Oliver was worried about me. That’s what he had said when I had met him for my weekly session before work today.
“I think it’s unusual that you’re mourning the loss of a person you never met.” He had said.
No shit, Oliver.
I had confided in him about how Ben hadn’t been responsive to my texts yesterday or today. Even before getting his raincheck message, I’d suspected something was wrong. I hadn’t had a lot of luck in the romance department, lately. Or ever, really. I knew I came on too strong and scared people off. But when the right person came along, they would find that endearing, right? They would be the same way.
“Hey, I got your chicken tikka.”
The short, bald girl was back. She strolled over to the booth I was sitting in and dropped the plastic takeout bag on the table. She turned on her heel, and I found myself watching her. The prickling heat in my underarms returned.
“Want to eat this with me?” I called out, my mouth moving before my brain could follow. The girl stopped and turned around, looking at me, her head tilted ever so slightly to the side.
“I’m on the clock,” she responded. “And I’m vegan.” she started to leave again. I could feel the blood rushing to my face in embarrassment. Why had I done that? I picked up the bag hurriedly, assembling my person as best I could when her voice snapped my head up.
“It’s on the house. You know, since you were gonna just walk away without paying.”
“I’m so sorry –” I stumbled over to the host podium, trying to dig out my credit card from my purse with the hand that wasn’t carrying the food.
“No, it’s on the house, I wasn’t trying to like –” now her face was flushed. I set my credit card down on the podium and snatched the receipt out of the takeout bag.
“No, it’s, that wasn’t cool of me.” the words fell out of my mouth like syrup, slow, and dripping, and utterly idiotic. My eyes fell on the bottom of the receipt, searching for the total. It was zeroed out; employee discount, it read. Underneath the three, neat little zeroes, was a phone number scribbled hastily in smudged blue ink. A sloppy smiley face sat next to it. I looked up at the girl, both of our faces red.
“Beth,” she said. “I’m Beth.”
***
“What did I tell you?” Liz hissed as she peered over my shoulder at the text from Ben that illuminated my screen. We were in our pajamas, sipping wine out of coffee mugs in my bed, hiding out from my roommate and her boyfriend, Todd. They were notorious for having loud sex when I was home. I was waiting for the day he finally got the nerve to propose to her so she would move out and I would be spared of sleepless nights listening to Tracie’s headboard bang against the wall of the hallway. This was our version of Thirsty Thursday; boxed Franzia and rom-coms. Call me a sadist, but tonight we had landed on He’s Just Not That Into You.
Thanksgiving seems to have healed me, it read. Drinks Saturday?
“Are you gonna go?” she pressed.
I looked at her sceptically. Did she even know me?
Oliver had told me if he responded that maybe some space might be healthy. As usual, he assumed I was a hyper-obsessive psycho. The look of pity that crossed his face whenever I was stupid enough to spill what I was thinking in one of our sessions disgusted me. Oliver was the kind of man who sneered at mention of social media or dating apps. He found them “primitive”, as he had once told me. I didn’t like how he presumed superiority for choosing not to interact with the world; like the old-fashioned way of doing things was somehow better. He was always spouting statistics about how social media causes people to be depressed. And every week, I coughed up over a hundred quid for him to tell me that. Oliver was a close friend of my mother’s, whom I had gotten to know over the course of several events she would drag me to in frilly, unflattering dresses throughout secondary school. When I movedout, she had insisted I start seeing him; something about how he would really understand me, having known me for so long.
What I hadn’t told my mother was that I didn’t like Oliver; I hadn’t then, and I didn’t now.
Sounds good! 8?
“You literally just took, like, three minutes to figure out that response.” Liz teased. She was smiling, and so was I. My phone buzzed with another notification. It was from Beth. I had held onto her number for the past couple days before texting her this morning. I had finally come to terms with the fact that Ben was never going to respond to me, and was attempting to open myself up to new avenues. Poor timing on my part.
Took you long enough! Thought I’d scared you off, she had responded.
Liz had lost interest in the communications flashing on and off my screen, and in all honesty, I was grateful. She always wanted to tell me how to date, who to date, where to go, what to wear, when to text, etc. I was grateful for the advice most of the time, but lately it had started to get under my skin. It was as if she didn’t consider me competent enough to figure it out for myself.
Liz was the kind of girl boys saw and sent drinks to. It had been that way in our university days. She was thin, well-toned and well-tanned. She curated her Instagram with a careful hand, and her dating app profiles were impeccable. She had this magical kind of power over strangers; she knew just what to say to make them like her. I was the opposite. After I’ve known someone for long enough, they often tell me how I came off as odd or judgemental on first encounter. Winning people over wasn’t exactly a strong suit of mine; not instantly, at least, the way Liz would. I’d like to think I cultivated loyalty, maybe even admiration. But it took a hell of a lot longer than the time it takes to down one Aperol spritz.
I was already ruminating on what to wear, all the way down to the colour nail polish, when Beth texted again.
Lunch on Sunday? My treat.
Why not?
I typed back “Sure.”***

I had attempted to be fashionably late to the bar we were meeting at. I liked it best when my dates got there before me. It was an old trick of Liz’s to show up just when the first inkling of doubt would appear in their mind. It gave you the upper hand.
He was absentmindedly drumming his fingers on the corner of the bar when I walked in. I had thought drinks would be easier; take the edge off, even if just a little. I’ve never liked first dates. They feel like a bad dream to me; the kind where you’re back in school, pushed unwillingly onto a stage in your underwear, and you can’t remember what it is you were supposed to sing or say. I checked my reflection in my phone and clicked on the lock screen; 8:12. Perfect.
“Ben…?”
His eyes darted up from the bar and he smiled. He looked nervous. I tried to read his face for his first impressions of me. Did he think I was pretty? Was he disappointed or pleasantly surprised? He waved at the bartender to bring us over drinks, and in the split-second he looked away from me, I tried to absorb as much information about him as possible. Cuffed jeans and button-up shirt had bicycles printed on it; whimsical, fun-loving. Tortoise-shell glasses; studious, old-fashioned. I promised myself to store away every detail to divulge to Liz afterwards.
We did the usual back and forth; what do you do? Where are you from? What do you like to do in your spare time? He was twenty-eight, working as an assistant to some higher-ups at the city’s art museum and liked to cook, run and listen to music. As it was my turn to list out the highlights of every dating profile app I had ever filled out, I realized how painfully ordinary I was. And I couldn’t help but wonder why the guy in front of me would want to meet at a boring bar to meet a boring girl and talk about boring things.
I had always imagined a good first date was supposed to be like this; the two of us were amicable, laughing at stories about roommates, and terrible jobs we used to have. We got progressively drunker throughout the night, so that when he stood up to use the bathroom, it looked as if, for a moment, he might tip over. I was a lightweight myself, but I figured I’d be alright if I remained firmly on the chair.
He had left his phone on the table and I could feel the magnetic pull of it. I heard Liz chastising me in my head; “don’t be creepy!”, but it was too late. I was looking at his lock screen, one eye remaining on the bathroom door.
One text from someone named Colton: Yo, u coming home tonight?
I scrolled. Some emails from work, it looked like.
Farther down, another text. This one from his mother: So glad you’re feeling better sweetie! Xx
I slipped the phone back across the table. Would he be going home tonight? I wasn’t exactly keen on inviting guys over to my place, but Tracie and Todd were out of town visiting her parents. They had left this morning. He checked off all the boxes; ambitious, intelligent, funny, not too serious. But he felt impossible to read. Was he having a good time? Was I being ambitious, intelligent, funny and not too serious?
I saw him across the room working his way back to the table.
“What do you think? Another round?” I asked, trying my best to sound innocent. He shrugged his shoulders.
“I’m down for either.”

“I could do one more.” I responded, teetering on the edge of my seat as I waved down the bartender. He asked for a refill on his beer; an IPA. I didn’t know beers well enough to know what that said about him.
“Can I ask you something?” I drummed my fingers on the edge of the bar, as he had before. I had read once mimicking a guys’ movement could show you were interested in him.
“Sure.”
“Do you go on a lot of first dates?”
“No… I don’t. Why?”
A girlish, high-pitched laugh escaped from my lips.
“No reason.”***

“It’s on me, seriously. No big deal.” Beth was sitting across from me at the diner. The sunlight hit her head in a way that I could see a thin layer of black stubble all over her head. She had snatched up the receipt before I had the chance.
“I feel bad,” I admitted.
She laughed, rolling her eyes at me.
“I asked you to lunch. I even told you then I was gonna pay!”
We were sitting in a booth at the diner across the street from Oliver’s office. It had been a busy week at work, and between it all, I hadn’t had a lot of spare time for lunches with strangers, so convenience was a priority. I had even told her I was rushing across the street to see my therapist after our date.
My head was pounding. I had had one too many drinks the night before at the bar with Ben. I thought it had gone well. Really well, honestly, but I was still waiting for a text from him. Across the table from me, Beth rummaged through her wallet for a card.
Was this a date?
I had been wondering on repeat through the entire meal. The way she leaned across the table at me, her eyes startlingly focused on me made me think so. But there was no sidling up, no overly flirtatious comments. Then again, she had written her number on the receipt and paid for the meal. Even Ben and I had split the tab at the bar. Liz was sure it was a date, but I was doubtful. It felt too casual, too natural to be anything more than lunch; just lunch.
“Tell me about this therapist. Is he any good?” she asked me while she scribbled a generous tip at the bottom of the receipt.
“He’s… well, he’s a family friend. I’ve known him since I was little.” I replied, chewing nervously on my bottom lip. What happened at the end of lunch that maybe was or was not a date? Would we hug?
“Doesn’t answer if he’s good or not.”
“I don’t know, he’s… he makes me feel like an idiot sometimes. But he’s fine. He’s honest.” I picked at a splatter of something sticky on my sweater. That hadn’t been there earlier.
“I don’t think your therapist is supposed to make you feel stupid. Maybe you need a new one?”
I shrugged.
“Maybe.” As the words escaped my mouth, I felt my phone buzz in my pocket. I mumbled a sorry across the table and checked it under the table. I felt my stomach fall. It wasn’t Ben, but Liz.
How’s date number two?
I saw the time in the corner of the screen. I had to get going.
“Everything okay?” Beth asked warily. I glanced back up. Had she seen the disappointment in my face?
“Yeah, I just, I have to get going.”
“Oh, yeah. Lemme walk you?”
We gathered up bags and coats to brave the unusually cold November that waited for us outside the cosy lair of the diner. I kept my hand on my phone in my pocket, hoping, praying it would buzz. It was almost 3:00, and he hadn’t sent anything after last night. I thought it had been a pretty spectacular first date. It had been.
We dashed across the crosswalk, the green man blinking, Beth tugging me along, laughing like a little kid. Breathless on the other side, I felt my cheeks blush. Her dangling gold earrings glinted in the sun, like little twinkling stars on either side of her smile. The sign on Oliver’s door read “Third Eye Counselling”.
I despised that name.
“I guess this is where we part ways. I, um. I had a lot of fun, Kate. I’ll text you tonight.” and without a moment’s hesitation, she leaned over and kissed me softly on the cheek, daringly close to my mouth. She spun around on her heel and began to walk away before I had a moment to say anything. It was as if the cold and bitter wind pushed her away. I stood there, watching her until I heard a familiar voice pull me out of my trance.
“There you are, Kate.” Oliver was leaning his head outside the door, calling out to me. “Come in!”
He ushered me into his office. It was decorated with that modern quality that implied someone was rich but didn’t want to “show off”. I sat down on the green couch, the seating option furthest away from his pretentious white armchair, a matching clipboard perched precariously on the arm. I didn’t have a reason for it to, but it drove me crazy that he kept notes about me. He closed the door behind me and meandered his way over to his desk to pour himself a cup of coffee.
“So, Kate,” he said in a purring voice as he settled into his chair, careful not to spill a single drop of coffee on its cream surface. “What can you tell me about this week? Did you go on the date with Ben?”
“I did.”
“And?” he asked, his voice lilting in that prodding way that made me feel like a test subject on a cold, metal lab table.
“It went well. Like, really well. Except I haven’t heard from him today.”
“Anything at all after the date?”
I paused.
“No,” I admitted.
He scribbled something down on his clipboard.
“Any other romantic prospects?” he asked.
“Nope.”
“None at all?”
“None at all.”